Jonaki Ray
“Homes Locked Away”
The tilt of her head parallels
the moustache of the hero,
who always defeats the villains,
in the poster that she’s standing in front of.
Hair matted like the twigs gathered
by pigeons attempting a home within stolen spaces
crowns her as she counterbalances
the patched bag slinging her shoulder.
Behind her, cars honk and swerve, angry mosquitoes scattered
by an unseen hand. Her shirt seems to tatter as she continues
to stare at the woman backgrounding the movie poster,
until the guard tells her to leave. “Where will I go?
I lost my living when everything was locked down.
I used to clean homes and live in a room that
is now taken back by my landlord!” she cries.
The guard, originally from the opposite side of the country,
shakes his head; he doesn’t speak the same language as her,
though they are fellow citizens. If he could, he would tell
the woman about his lost land, sold to a new-age guru,
which made him leave his home and his wife and his son
and look for a new job when the old guards walked home after the lockdown.
But … he has learnt that some losses cannot be measured by words.
So, he says nothing. Instead, he gives her some water, and waves her on.
She limps forward, on a road lined by placards
and the flags of a politician proclaiming,
“The way to be happy and attain one’s desires is to believe.”